A New Kind of Hunger
by Starberry-Cupcake
Summary: Katniss starts to realize that Peeta is not only the one she needs, but the one she loves, so she lets that new kind of hunger to take over her...Between the end of Mockingjay and the Epilogue


**Disclaimer: **I do not own "The Hunger Games"; if I did, Finnick Odair would still be charming us with his presence.

**Pairing: **Katniss x Peeta (gotta love the Boy with the Bread )

**Raiting: **T, there's_ very _soft lemon, but I've been suggested to put it in T, so here it is...

**When it takes place: **Mockingjay, somewhere in between the end, before the epilogue.

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A New Kind of Hunger

My name is Katniss Everdeen and I'm a survivor. And like one of them, I can tell you that the hardest thing about surviving is living afterwards, knowing what you've lost and getting used to your scars: the ones in your skin and the ones in your heart.

It took me a long time to be able to go back to a lonelier and more uncomfortable version of my life before the Games, before the revolution, before being the Mockingjay. I think things started to change when I saw he was back. We talked once I saw him, when he told me about the Primroses he brought, but it took more time in between to talk again.

When we did, we were in Haymitch's house.

I am taking Haymitch the rest of the food Greasy Sae made for me, because I couldn't really eat anymore, and I thought maybe Haymitch would like it. Or maybe I just want to check if he is ok. I can't bare someone I know leaving again in any way. Once I go in, I don't see Haymitch, I see him.

"He went back to sleep" Peeta tells me; putting some bread, that seemed to be just made, in a counter.

"I brought him food" I say, not knowing really if I should say something or just shut up.

"Yeah, me to" Peeta smiled ironically "The last thing we want is him to die out of hunger, right?"

Peeta's dark and ironic comments, the ones he used to say after the Capitol took him from me. I don't know how to deal with that, how to say something without feeling we are back to those moments when he hated me, when he thought I wasn't even human.

"Do…do you want some?" he offers me some of his fresh bread, maybe thinking his comment made me remember the Games or other stuff we've been through…or the people we've lost…or Prim…

"Yes" I answer, before I follow that line of thoughts and I get lost in a daydreaming nightmare.

Peeta looks around, at the disgusting mess Haymitch's kitchen had turn into, and changes his mind.

"Let's go to my place, I have more bread there…and the place smells a little nicer…" he starts to walk to the door as I follow him with a smile on my face, one I can't hold back.

I can't even remember the last time I couldn't hold back a smile.

* * *

After that, we eat together every day. I hunt, Greasy Sae makes food, Peeta makes bread, desserts, cakes, cookies that I always eat happily. They are always colorful and sweet, like a breath of fresh air after all the gray and the sadness that we were surrounded by since we came back to District 12.

It is in one of our meals when I tell him about the book: a book that gathers our memories and keeps them there, far from our minds and our dreams but also present, as a testimony they've happened.

"I've told Dr Aurelius about it and he said it was ok" I tell him "I want to put there all those things I don't have to forget"

"It sounds like a good idea" he comments shyly.

"And I need you, Peeta" I say.

He lifts his blue eyes and looks straight at mine, deeply, like trying to get what I've just said, like feeling there's another meaning in those words.

"You want me to draw? Like last time?" he says, and that last time seems like a lifetime ago.

I'd like to tell him the truth, that it isn't just that, that I need him to be there, to hold me if it's too much for me and I fall apart, to feel his arms around me when I can't take it anymore. But I can't. I don't know how much is there left of the Peeta who would have seen that as an opportunity to be closer to me, and how much is there of the one who would think I'm a monster that's using him for my own personal purposes. And I'm scared to know the answer.

"Yes, it will be better if you could draw…we could do this…together" I can't say anymore, I'm useless when it comes to getting closer to people, I just seem to be able to push them away.

"I like the idea" Peeta gets up from my table and walks towards the door "You know, I just remembered something Gale said…funny huh?" he smiles, not looking at me but like gazing a memory of something that happened a long time ago, and leaves.

Gale? What's that supposed to mean? When was the last time he spoke to Gale?…

And then I remember: _"Katniss will choose whoever she __**needs**__ to survive"_. That's what Gale said. But Peeta didn't know that I was listening to them. So that's why he stared at me…

"_And I need you, Peeta"_

My words float around in my head, making me feel dizzy. Did I mean it? Did I just choose Peeta?

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We become closer and closer, and even start sleeping next to each other again, holding and calming each other when our dreams threaten with hunting us. Still, I think I got the first glimpse of an answer to that question, if I had chosen Peeta or not, the first time we kissed. I mean, the first time in this lifetime, in this "after the Games" life. And it felt more like a first time than the actual first.

We are in my study, making the book. Or, at least, that's what I am doing, writing as neatly as I can about my past life; in this case, about school. Peeta is supposed to be drawing the school itself; he is sitting in the desk while I am on the floor, with notes around me in every direction.

"Ok, I think I'm done" I say, with a triumphal tone, as I stretch my arms "What about you?"

"Almost" Peeta answers shortly, as if he doesn't want to be interrupted.

So I wait, looking at him draw. His sight lost in his sketch; his hands moving around with confidence, as mine when I hold the bow; his hair shining with the sun rays that come through the window. Watching him there, being my Peeta, the one I knew before the Capitol took him away, that is the best therapy.

"Done" he says, smiling, and walks towards me.

He sits on the floor next to me and hands me the drawing. And I have to say, it is not at all what I've expected.

Instead of the school, my classmates, a teacher or any of what he could have made, he drew me. A young me, the one I was in school, sitting in my spot, looking at the front of the class but with a mind lost in other things: in my mother and her inability to support us, in my father not being around anymore, in my need to hunt and do everything in my might to save us…and in Prim. In Prim and how much I wanted her to survive.

"I tried to draw the school, really, but all I could think of when I thought of it was the girl I gave the bread to. The one I fell for. That's all I had in my mind when I went to school" Peeta looks at me, concerned, as he watches me being unable to stop tears from slipping through my face. "I'm sorry, Katniss"

Sorry? Why is he sorry for? He took all those things from me, all the things I couldn't even order in my mind to write about, and made a beautiful drawing, so beautiful that the real Katniss could never be as magnificent as that one.

"Thank you" I say, lifting my head to look at him, with tears still through my face.

He smiles and wipes away my tears with his thumb, with the same hands that had just draw this face he knew by heart. Our eyes are connected for a moment I think that lasts forever, until I come closer and press my lips on his. I didn't understand how much I missed this, how much I needed him, until I have him again and feel that he belongs to me, and that I belong to him.

I cross my arms behind his neck, lean forward, and lose myself in his embrace, in his kiss, in him. He takes me from my waist and moves me with no effort at all, making me sit on his lap, so he can have a better access to my mouth. And I thank him for it in my mind, as soon as his lips become more intertwined with mine and his tongue makes his way through my mouth. I release a soft moan of pleasure and feel him smile against my lips.

I pull back, with a red shade through my face and embarrassed of myself and my inability to control my emotions better.

"You were never very comfortable in these situations" he says, laughing softly.

I shoot daggers at him, releasing my embrace of his neck and crossing my arms in front of my chest. I would have stood up and left if it wasn't for his firm hold of my body on this lap; as if he was scared we would be separated again.

"I'm sorry, Katniss" he says.

And this time he means it, not like that time when he mocked me for being embarrassed at Johanna's behavior; this time he is scared I am angry enough to leave. How can I never understand what he's feeling until it is too late and the damage is already made?

"What are you sorry for?" I say, lifting his head so he looks me in the eyes again "That was the best kiss you've gave me so far…or at least it was one of the best…"

"Oh, so you keep track of them?" his smile comes back, the smile that I seem to need so much.

"Some are just…impossible to forget" I answer "Maybe they should be in the book"

"All right, but I'm gonna need some inspiration, you know" his smile widens, as he leans forward and I embrace him again, and we kiss, hungry for each other.

A kind of hunger I'm beginning to like more and more.

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Things start to become easier for us, as long as we are together to support each other. Nights become more and more bearable with kisses from his lips and his hands caressing my skin. Until one night, my need to have him closer starts turning more and more into the same hunger that over took me on the beach, that kind of hunger I'm starting to get used to but I still haven't satisfied.

I turn to him and look at his calmed face through the dim light that comes through the window from the moon shining outside. He's sleeping, breathing softly, his heart beating in a steady rhythm and his eyelashes shining with the light that surrounds us. I can't fight my feelings, and kiss him softly in the cheek and see him turn his head towards me, like asking for more attention. I find it weird, because he usually gets up shocked and scared with any unpredictable contact while he sleeps; the main reason why I didn't want to kiss him in the first place right now.

"You _need_ me, real or not real?" he whispers to me; still with his eyes closed but completely awake.

"You were cheating!" I say, with a frown and a blush I hope doesn't get to see "I thought you were asleep…"

"You haven't answered me" he says, opening his eyes.

His blue eyes and his delicate eyelashes are even more catching and beautifully surreal under the dim moonlight.

"Real" I almost whisper, still looking at him in the eyes.

And what I see in them is exactly what he sees in mine: the glimpse of that new kind of hunger, the one we feel for each other and is stronger than any nightmare, fear or bad memory that could hunt us tonight.

We both lean towards each other, we both kiss, we both move our bodies in synch to be closer, to access each other better, to let each other do to us what we want to do with the other. It's not like when I hunted with Gale and we understood each other without saying anything, because here we don't know what we're doing next, we don't know what we're hunting, how to satisfy our hunger. For us is a discovery we're experimenting together, and we move and act in synch because we seem to want the same. We seem to feel the same.

After what we've been through, the pain that was supposed to be there, the fear or anticipation, the awkwardness of a first time; it doesn't seem anything. It is more about pleasure, about need and more than anything, about love.

With every touch, every kiss, every exploration to parts of our bodies I thought I'd never let anyone to; we become more confident, we go further and we do more. After we're both simultaneously satisfied, we lay next to each other, catching our breaths.

I heard him say my name in ways I never thought I would love so much, I heard him say he loves me once and again. I've cried out his name myself, not able to feel embarrassed about it because it made us both more and more hungry. But I can't recall if I told him the most important thing…

"You love me, real or not real?" he whispers to me, and I realize I haven't.

"Real" I answer, extremely sure.

We kiss again and fall asleep next to each other. I don't have nightmares, I dream of him; but the best thing is that, when I wake up, he is there and the dream was just an extension of an unbelievable reality. A reality we both deserve now and we will try to live the best we can. Together.

**The End**

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**Well, I hope you've liked it! I'm sorry if there are some mistakes, I usually write in spanish and I've read the books in spanish as well, so there were things I had to check before writing it. I loved this books and I felt I wanted to create my version of what happened between Katniss and Peeta to lead them to that end. **

**Thanks for reading!**


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